Becoming a product manager: Nick, Alice, Lucia, and Jonathan share their tips and triumphs
Product management is a critical role at the intersection of a lot of teams in the tech industry. But many universities don’t have the ability to train their students in a hands-on way that will prepare them to be PMs after graduation. So a few years back, we started our New Grad Product Management Program. From their first day on the job, recent college graduates are able to develop their skills as real, full-fledged PMs, with all the support they need to become successful leaders for their teams. Alice Deng, Nick Turley, Lucia Zhang, and Jonathan Avila have all passed through our ranks as part of this program and have found it a perfect introduction to the world of tech.
As a history and business major from UC Berkeley, Alice knew she was interested in product management, but wasn’t sure what to expect when applying for the program. It seemed so unrelated to what she had studied. Now a PM on our Paper team, she suggests that others put themselves out there to get the application advice they need. It may just be right at their fingertips.
“I wasn’t sure how to prepare for the interviews. It was hard because I didn’t know anyone else who was applying as a PM, so I didn’t know who to talk to. I randomly reached out to a Dropboxer who had previously been a PM, and he was really helpful in explaining the process and the role and calmed all my fears. So I would suggest reaching out to Dropboxers or PMs you know and ask them about their role! If you’re excited about it and think it’s right for you, the interview process goes pretty naturally. A lot of candidates don’t know what PMing is when they go through the interviews, but it’s not that hard to talk to people and figure out if the role is for you.”
Nick Turley, a PM on the ecosystem team, studied philosophy and computer science in college. One of our first program participants, he has been with Dropbox for about two years. The flexibility and personalization of the program is one of the factors that has made him stay.
“I expected Dropbox to train me, and give me enough scope of impact to learn and grow on my own. What was really cool was that I was sort of able to design my own PM education here. I wasn’t asked to rotate at a given time, it was all personalized, and I benefitted from the fact that while we were large enough to have capacity to train me, there was enough flexibility in the program that I could tailor it to my own educational goals. Very few people knew I was a new grad; to them I was a PM. So I had the benefit of a lot of training programs and workshops, but also had the benefit of being taken very seriously.”
While Alice and Nick have been working as PMs with us for a while, Lucia and Jonathan have yet to experience the full program. Both start their roles on August 27th. But just from the interview process, they feel they’re in for a positive, immersive, and educational experience. Lucia, who studied economics and business administration at UC Berkeley, was worried that she might not qualify for the role — but quickly found that her lack of experience in tech wasn’t really important at all.
“Having a non-technical education when other product manager hopefuls all had CS on their resumes was something that I struggled with a ton. It put me in this weird and damaging mindset going into the process. However, the entire recruiting team assured me to just bring my best self to the table and not focus on what I lacked but showcase my strengths instead. For example, the presentation portion of the onsite is a self-directed showcase of whatever you want. I had thought this was where I would scrape together any technical knowledge I had in my pocket to try and convince the interviewers that I was some coding queen! But I modified my presentation to focus less on the technical aspects of my internship project and more so on the areas that excited me. I feel like Dropbox looks for that ‘special sauce’ in candidates that isn’t limited to specific experiences or knowledge. Everyone in the program brings something different to the table, so be sure to own your individuality and just do you!”
Jonathan studied economics and got his masters in computer science, so he feels that he has a decent balance of technical and non-technical knowledge going into the program. However, he too has found that what got him the job was much more than just what he could do on a keyboard.
“Don’t handicap yourself by thinking you’re not qualified and not applying. When Dropbox interviews, they’re looking for the Dropboxer quality above all, and that’s something that’s naturally determined through the interview process. The process also focused on the technical aspects of the internships I’d previously had and projects I had worked on at school, which is closer to what you need as a product manager. More of it is knowing how to work with other people rather than needing to know how to write code on a whiteboard!”
Interested in learning more about what skills might qualify you for our New Grad PM program? Check out our jobs page to explore this and other opportunities for new graduates.
